Traveling to Butlins

On Monday me and Tilly woke bright and early to get the train to Butlins, we knew it would be a long journey with multiple trains as by avoiding the direct route thought London, we were able to save about £30. However neither of us expected what a palaver it would be.

waiting patiently for our train.

When we left the house pulling our over packed suitcases, me and Tilly looked at each other, looked at a lady waiting at the bus stop, looked at each other again and both said lets get the bus. Tilly then decided that everyone who got on the bus needed to know she was going to Butlins and she had fun laughing at her friends when the bus went past her school!

Because we got the bus, we had time to pop into the supermarket to get a picnic. We then walked to the train station pleased that we had plenty of time to spare and didn't have to rush. When we arrived at the train station I was surprised how busy it was, it was then that I realised that there was a signalling fault at the next station down and all trains where cancelled.

This is when panic started to set in as a had a plan and needed to follow it. I calmly got into the queue to speak to a member of staff who then closed his counter in order to phone around as he was unsure what was happening. When he returned he said that there were bus replacements on the way. However then the bus replacement bus going in the opposite direction arrived, people piled on and the driver had to turn people away as the bus was full. It then took about 15 minutes to get out of car park as it was too long to turn around. At this point I did think we may never reach Butlins!

we finally got on the train

About 10 minutes later the member of staff then announced that they had fixed the problem and the next train would be running. This filled me with relief. Me and Tilly then sat in the waiting room and she was so well behaved, she used her suitcase as a sledge and was rolling down a slope. Not once did she complain that she was bored and she did exactly what she was told.

Tilly was so much better behaved then some of the other passenger who decided to take then anger out by being rude to the member of staff. The member of staff however did his best to remain calm and help everyone the best he could. Not sure if I could have remained so calm while someone was shouting at me that they had been waiting an hour and a half for their train.

Finally the next train arrived and we all jumped on happy to be on our way to Butlins if just an hour and a bit later then planned (I could have had a whole extra hour in bed!). Luckily we didn't face any more delays and after what felt like a journey of several days we arrived.